


can you see the stars in broad daylight?

by predebut



Category: ENHYPEN (Band)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Pining, Sunoo Does Sunghoon's Makeup And Everything Follows From There, Tenderness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-16 23:22:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29832489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/predebut/pseuds/predebut
Summary: “Relax,” Sunoo whispers. He’s dabbing something onto Sunghoon’s cheeks, spreading it across his skin with nimble fingers. “It’s just me here, hyung.”But it’s neverjustanything, when it comes to Kim Sunoo. And there’s something about having Sunoo’s hands on him—this sort of closeness that’s rare to come across, nowadays—that makes Sunghoon feel as if he’s being shaped through that touch.Sunghoon wants to know how Sunoo sees him. He wishes to be made over and then undone again.
Relationships: Kim Sunoo/Park Sunghoon
Comments: 26
Kudos: 106





	can you see the stars in broad daylight?

**Author's Note:**

> written for h's birthday. dear h: this is not the #confident_bisexual_sunghoon pov you asked for but at least psh isn't undergoing a sexuality crisis...? title from [here](https://rhodochrosite.dreamwidth.org/16837.html).

knowing is not linear but it is shimmering. the heart shimmers 60 - 100 times a minute. like an ocean. we call this Beating. like it’s a race. 

— _california in the summer and my hair is growing long_ , Jess Rizkallah

—

It’s a Sunday afternoon when Sunghoon finally agrees to let Sunoo do his makeup.

He sits perched on a too-small wooden stool dragged over from the desk, watching Sunoo through the mirror as he rummages through his makeup products.

“I didn’t think you’d actually say yes, hyung,” Sunoo admits, his hands still for a moment.

Sunghoon makes eye contact with Sunoo’s reflection and raises his eyebrows. “Then why’d you ask in the first place?”

Sunoo’s bedroom glows at this time of day, golden light streaming in through the windows. He can see dust motes floating faintly in the beamed light, shadows rendered warmer here, somehow.

“Oh.” Sunoo blinks at him, briefly surprised, before his startled expression melts into a smile. “Yeah, you’re right.”

For a long time, Sunghoon had accustomed himself to having the shades drawn here, had forgotten the windows could let in anything more than teasing hints of sunshine. For a long time, he’d only visit Sunoo’s apartment when he had an excuse for it—stealing the missed classwork out of Ahn Seongmin’s hands in order to drop them off at Sunoo’s bedside personally. Taking any justification to see Sunoo smile up at him weakly, the only source of brightness in the damn room, and whisper _don’t worry about me, hyung_ with shaky certainty.

But for a long time, Sunghoon hadn’t allowed Sunoo to put makeup on him either. Hadn’t understood how important—and simple—it could be for him.

“Okay, now I think I have everything,” Sunoo announces. He lines up every product in a neat line, like a row of toy soldiers. Makeup as his armor, protection. It’s a lot to take in: the lip tint is easy enough to recognize, along with the cushions he’s seen girls at school apply in between classes, but he doesn’t have the vocabulary yet to name most of the other items.

Sunghoon can’t help himself. “ _All_ of it? That’s going on my face?”

Sunoo fixes him a look. “Do you trust me?” Sunghoon would think him angry, or annoyed, but he can see the way Sunoo’s hands keep fidgeting with one of the bottles. Nervous.

This is something that means a lot to Sunoo. Sunghoon doesn’t know much about makeup, but he knows it’s another thing that helps Sunoo become himself. Some sort of way to help Sunoo outline the amorphous edges of who he is. Like attending dance club practices after school and sneaking out to buy drinks from an off-campus convenience store and laughing ever so beautifully: it’s just a part of Kim Sunoo.

So Sunghoon doesn’t say anything, just nods. _Yes, I trust you._ He pretends he doesn’t hear Sunoo’s sigh of relief.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.” Sunoo smiles with satisfaction, the curve of his mouth catching the light. It reminds Sunghoon of—

The first time he’d ever seen Sunoo wear lip tint: bold and shiny, something he couldn’t take his eyes off of. Later, he’d gone home and slept through restless dreams of red.

He should be used to it by now.

Sunoo hovers over him, wiping at his face. He’s so close that Sunghoon can smell his perfume: lemons, made sweet. He’s so close that it’s hard for Sunghoon to make out the whole of his face. It’s disorienting to have all the details but none of the big picture—almost dream-like. Sunghoon doesn’t know how to describe it; he doesn’t have the vocabulary for a lot of things, he’s beginning to realize.

“Close your eyes, hyung,” Sunoo orders. Sunghoon obeys. He lets his vision burn orange with the sun shining through as Sunoo wipes the facial tissue over his eyelids. He almost zones out, even.

Sunoo thinks he agreed to this whole makeup thing because of the breakup, keeps insisting that _he’s over it_ and _it really isn’t a big deal, hyung_. But that’s not the whole story. In truth, Sunghoon often just wished he could find a way to show Sunoo how he saw him, hands itching for a way to make Sunoo _understand_ how he felt—but he had nothing. Not like Jaeyun and his photography, rearranging shadows to tell a story of affection, or like Jongseong and his determination to warp language to his own will, twisting it into something beautiful and wholly his.

Every time Sunghoon speaks, his words come out slow and hesitant. It’s hard for him to collect the wispiness of his thoughts into anything substantial; he’s too used to the fog of his internalities, some sort of feeling within him that lives unnameable and burning in his throat.

For a long time, Sunghoon had just let Sunoo dictate all there was to be said between the two of them. Over the years he’d never strayed beyond the boundary of childhood friends turned distanced schoolmates. He’d said yes to anything Sunoo asked of him: getting dragged along to coin karaoke; to walking home from school late after their respective clubs had ended; to Sunoo showing him a cute selca from a classmate of his and saying _he asked me out, what should I reply—?_

“It tickles.”

“Relax,” Sunoo whispers. He’s dabbing something onto Sunghoon’s cheeks, spreading it across his skin with nimble fingers. “It’s just me here.”

But it’s never _just_ anything, when it comes to Kim Sunoo. And there’s something about having Sunoo’s hands on him—this sort of closeness that’s rare to come across, nowadays—that makes Sunghoon feel as if he’s being shaped through that touch.

Sunghoon wants to know how Sunoo sees him. He wishes to be made over and then undone again.

He’s always wanted, but he’s never known how to go about it. On the other hand, Sunoo would rather try than not have anything at all. Maybe that’s the difference between the two of them. Maybe that’s why Sunghoon knows he doesn’t have a shot, for if he did then Sunoo could have done something about it already.

Sunghoon swallows. He needs to stop thinking. “Can you—can you tell me what you’re doing?”

“I just put on some blush, hyung,” Sunoo replies. “You know, you can open your eyes and take a look if you’d like.”

Sunghoon shakes his head. It’s easier if he doesn’t look, at least while Sunoo is so close. “Not until you’re finished, Sunoo-yah.”

Sunoo hums. “Suit yourself.” Then, as he goes along, he continues to name every step. Each new word drops down like a flower petal at Sunghoon’s feet. It’s easy to lose track of time like this—caught up in the hazy warmth of Sunoo’s bedroom, the honey of Sunoo’s voice, the softness of everything surrounding him. The hard lines of the stool he sits on are the only sharp edge he knows.

No, that’s wrong: Sunoo has sharp edges, too. He just doesn’t need them around Sunghoon. _Didn’t_ need them, until Sunoo’s new relationship had created distance that felt impossible to breach. In the midst of preparing for the suneung, Sunghoon hadn’t realized the emptiness that existed between them until it seemed all-encompassing, something that could swallow him up whole.

But Sunghoon’s trying, now. To appeal to Sunoo, to make up for that lost time. And he thinks Sunoo has noticed, too, hiding his pleased smiles for when he thinks Sunghoon isn’t looking.

“Okay, I’m finished now,” Sunoo announces. He rests his palms on Sunghoon’s shoulders, steady, as Sunghoon stands up from the stool. “Come on hyung, open your eyes.”

Sunghoon blinks his eyes open. He doesn’t know what he expects; Sunoo mostly just looks like himself with the saturation turned on high with makeup, not anything drastically different. In the same way, Sunghoon completely recognizes the self that stares back at him in the mirror. He’s both softer and brighter, cheeks and lips pink, gentler-looking while framed in this way.

Shimmering. That’s what it is. He’s shimmering, lit up from within. Or maybe it’s just the afternoon sun. Maybe it’s Sunoo beside him in the mirror, looking so satisfied at his work. Sunghoon thinks he might understand the appeal, now.

Is this what he looks like in Sunoo’s eyes? Not just cheaply handsome, his grade’s token pretty boy—a role he’d never been able to fulfill completely with his inherent awkwardness—but someone beautiful, too?

“Woah.” Sunghoon tilts his head, observing the way sunlight falls through the windows and onto his cheeks. “It looks really good, Sunoo-yah.” _They_ look good, side by side like this.

“Really?” Sunoo says, pleased. “I think so too, honestly.”

Sunoo turns to him, then, reaching out to brush something off of his cheek. Thumb against his skin, soft as a feather. “Oh—hyung, you had an eyelash here.”

“Make a wish,” Sunghoon says, nonsensically, because it’s too much to _look_ at Sunoo and be this close at the same time.

Sunoo just keeps looking at him, steady. Even when he’s too sick to go to school, or teasing Sunghoon, or overly excited about Produce 48, there’s this undercurrent of assuredness to him. Sunghoon can’t bring himself to close his eyes again or look away.

“What would you wish for, then?” Sunoo replies.

Sunghoon wonders if it’s too forward to lean closer. If it’s too much to just say _you._ If he’s overthinking it or perhaps not giving it enough thought at all. Because it’s always been Sunoo, this unnamed thing he holds in his heart, and he worries that speaking it into the air between them might cause the grip on his feelings to slip.

“Won’t the wish not come true if I tell you?” Sunghoon manages to say.

Sunoo lets out an exasperated sigh, the moment broken. “ _Hyung_.” Another sigh, and he turns his head away. “Fine, don’t answer my question.”

Maybe Sunghoon will never have the vocabulary for it, for how he feels.

Or maybe Sunoo might know some of the words.

It’s now or never. “Why don’t you answer my question first?” Sunghoon returns.

Sunoo faces him again, raising his eyebrows. “Which is?”

“What is this?” Sunghoon asks. He thinks he sees a spark of recognition in Sunoo’s eyes, in the warm brown color that holds so much depth.

“What is what?” Sunoo echoes, a challenge.

“This.” Sunghoon exhales. “Us.”

“Haven’t you always known?” Sunoo says in return.

It dawns on Sunghoon in a split second, sudden and abrupt. A movie set on fast-forward, a moment he’ll want to go back and rewind countless times. And he sees, now, Sunoo’s infinite patience. How he’d simply been waiting for him to make the first step, not expectant, but not surprised either.

So Sunghoon does what he’s been longing after for years. He leans down, hovering over Sunoo’s glossy lips, and he kisses him.

His heart fills with sunshine, with the brightest sort of light. Finally.

—

(“How couldn’t you tell?” Sunoo says, after. The sun is beginning to set, and his cheeks glow a burnished orange. “It’s not every day I use my makeup on a boy who doesn’t even know what blush is, hyung.”

“Then you must know, too.” Sunghoon smiles, marveling at the boy before him. So bright and lovely. “It isn’t every day I let someone put makeup on me, either.”)

**Author's Note:**

> sorry if this was bad i wrote it pretty quickly and it's unbetaed / comments are appreciated TT___TT
> 
> [twt](http://twitter.com/storyboxed) \+ [cc](http://curiouscat.qa/wished) ^__^


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